


forms of the soul

by vomara



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemons, Daemon Settling, Daemons, Family, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Minor Character Death, Non Consensual Daemon Touching, Other Character Tags to be Added - Freeform, Shorts, Symbolism, amongst other things
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-23
Updated: 2020-08-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:55:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,819
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26062261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vomara/pseuds/vomara
Summary: Short glimpses into an ATLA Daemon AU.
Relationships: Aang & Zuko (Avatar), Azula & Zuko (Avatar), Katara & Sokka (Avatar)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 50





	1. Katara, vigil

**Author's Note:**

> i'm probably not going to write too much of this, but i've got at least three little shorts i'm going to post on here. i've been thinking about this lately, let's leave it at that.

The night after the Fire Nation tore her mother from her, they built a campfire outside. The Water Tribes have never cared to burn their dead, but the men of the tribe have to hold vigil until her mother’s soul passes. They need to stand the night under the light of Tui, and during the cold Arctic nights, they cannot do that without a fire.

Katara hates it.

Dad places a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Katara, you should get some rest. You don’t have to stay up the whole night.”

She knows that. Only the warriors are required to stay the whole night, but she can’t seem to make herself go inside. Sokka’s on the opposite side of dad, wedged between him and Bato. His eyes are drooping, his face appearing almost as weathered as the older warriors in the flickering light of the hearth. Katara wonders if she looks like that, too, her jaw sharper like her mother’s, the same creases at the corners of her mouth, the same tired bags under her eyes.

“I can stay up,” she replies.

Dad watches her with those sad eyes of his, and he curls an arm around her. Sokka wobbles in his seat, on the verge of falling asleep, and dad brings his other arm around him, letting him rest against his chest. Siku picks Ticasuk up by the scruff, bringing her to rest against Pana. Then she licks at them, grooming them gently. Pana leans into her touch, shifting into a wolfdog, and together they lay beside Ticasuk as the night burns away.

Time passes, and Katara’s not quite sure how much. She spends it watching the fire for a while, letting a newfound anger course through her. But the anger doesn’t last, and her eyes are drawn to the sky. A thin veil of clouds cross over them, like a film of debris obscuring the stars. Maybe it actually was debris -- the remnants of black snow, a reminder of their loss.

A soft pat on her arm breaks her out of her reverie. “You should sleep now,” Dad says.

“I don’t want to.”

He gestures lightly to Sokka, snoring against his chest. “Try for your brother.”

No matter how dad adjusts Sokka, it’s a clearly uncomfortable position. Her brother can’t sleep like this. And her father can’t keep vigil like this, either.

She nods. “Okay.”

Dad smiles at her, a small smile, but a kind one nevertheless. “Good.” He picks Sokka up in his arms, holding him like a child several years younger. Siku does the same with Ticasuk, and they walk to the Gran-Gran’s igloo together. He wakes Sokka lightly to help him crawl inside, and Katara follows, Pana dragging Ticasuk in front of her.

“I’ll see you in the morning,” Dad says, crouching down. “Sleep tight.” He turns around to walk back to the vigil circle.

Gran-Gran’s already fast asleep, too old to keep vigil with the rest of the men. As an elder, she doesn’t have to. Sokka fumbles as he crawls into his bedroll, and Pana nudges Ticasuk into the bedroll beside him. Katara reaches over, adjusting the corner for him, and pauses as Sokka grabs her hand.

“Thanks, K’tara,” he slurs. Hands clumsy and uncoordinated, he pats her arm reassuringly.

A feeling rushes through her, deep and overwhelming, and for a moment, she thinks she understands what her mother felt. How she could’ve been so brave even in the face of inevitable death. There is nothing she wouldn’t do to protect this, whatever _this_ is.

She brings her bedroll closer to his that night, and Pana changes form and sleeps between them, his body heating them better than any flame. His wings rest against them, another blanket to keep them warm, another shield to keep them safe.

When Katara wakes, Pana’s watching her. She leans out to scratch behind his ears.

He rumbles contentedly, and sighs. _“This is it.”_

He doesn’t need to elaborate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Katara -- Pana (Inuit god who cares for souls in the underworld before they are reincarnated), sea otter-goose.  
> Sokka -- Ticasuk (Inuit name meaning "where the four winds gather their treasures from all parts of the world...the greatest which is knowledge"), unsettled.  
> Hakoda -- Siku (Inuit name meaning "ice"), gray wolf-fox.
> 
> hybrids are the most common type of daemons in this au, as they are most similar to the actual animals of the ALTA universe.


	2. Azula, blue

“Dad’s gonna kill you,” Azula singsongs from his doorway. Anantachai curls around her leg, mirth written on his feline features. “Really, he is.”

Zuko tries not to startle at her voice, but he can’t help it. “Ha, ha, Azula, nice try.” She’s lying. She has to be.

“Fine, don’t believe me,” she says, approaching the bed. “But I heard everything. Grandfather thought father’s punishment should fit his crime.” Her voice lowers as she imitates grandfather’s threat. _“You must know the pain of losing a firstborn son by sacrificing your own.”_

A wave of terror overcomes Zuko, and he grasps his blankets helplessly. Rahmi hides under the covers, quiet as a mouse, tucking her face into the side of his leg. “Liar.”

“I’m only telling you for your own good,” Azula replies, standing up next to his bed. Her form is hazy in the darkness, the edges defined only by the light coming through the door.

Behind her, a single color draws Zuko’s eye. Ananta shifts, his form slipping, his musculature becoming all at once flat, his skin brilliant in tone. A pure, sharp blue, the likes of which Zuko had never seen on a daemon. He swallows thickly, an instinctive fear coursing through him. Azula’s daemon had never taken this form before.

The daemon flies circles around them, silent as Azula continues to taunt him. “I know. Maybe you could find a nice Earth Kingdom family to adopt you.”

Zuko squeezes his eyes shut. “Stop it, you’re lying,” he starts, but his voice falters, because at that moment, Ananta lands on his hand. He feels the scritch-scritch of his insect legs before he sees the creature, but the moment he recognizes it, his eyes fly open.

Blue consumes his vision as the daemon languidly stretches his wings. He seems almost mocking as he sits on him, digging his appendages into Zuko’s arm. Zuko can count the number of times Ananta’s spoken to him on both hands, but he still recognizes his voice when he hears it. _“Why would we lie?”_ Ananta asks, laughter in his tone. _“Sometimes the truth is worse than anything we could ever come up with.”_

Azula’s smile cuts like a dagger, and fear runs down his spine. No discomfort on her face, even though Ananta is lounging on his hand. She’s _smiling_ as she leans on his bed. And through the sheets, Zuko feels her fingers pry, searching for a hidden form. She finds what she’s looking for, her hand pressing down.

Rahmi squeaks, trying to escape Azula’s grasp, and Zuko’s heart beats faster. “Azula, stop it!” He pushes against her hand, and Ananta flies upwards, landing on his nose. The blue obscures his sight completely, Ananta’s beady eyes boring into his own, and now Zuko’s sweating, and shaking, and he feels sick, panic coursing through him. “Azula, stop! _Stop!_ ” He grabs at Rahmi with one hand blindly, while the other reaches up to pull Ananta away and then --

Azula’s looking at him with wide eyes, her expression dropping away, and suddenly, Zuko can feel the silky membrane in his hand. The daemon. He’s touching her daemon. He’s grabbing her daemon, practically crushing it.

He lets go.

Azula steps back for a moment, before her lip curls. Her fist tightens sharply around Rahmi’s form, choking her out.

He barely manages to cry out before a voice cuts through the air. _“What is going on here?”_

Azula retracts her hand quickly, so as not to get caught, and Rahmi burrows into his leg, clinging to him like a newborn koalacub. She’s trembling, and Zuko reaches a hand under his blanket to calm her down.

Ananta lands on Azula’s shoulder as a parrot-shrike, the blue disappearing as rapidly as it came. His previous form is no more, but Zuko will never forget it.

* * *

The next day, mother is gone.

From across the courtyard, a large butterfly daemon sits on Azula’s shoulder. Non-hybrid, rare. Size, remarkable. Color, prized.

It’s settled.

* * *

Three days after that, her fire burns blue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Azula -- Anantachai (Thai name meaning "infinite victory", Ananta alone is "infinite/boundless"), Blue Morpho butterfly.  
> Zuko -- Rahmi (Indonesian name meaning "mercy"), unsettled.
> 
> azula's daemon is a non-hybrid, which makes it exceptionally rare, and a sign of power. it may seem like it doesn't suit her, but consider the image of a giant blue butterfly silently flying ahead of her, an ominous symbol to come. her daemon is also... peculiarly quiet for a daemon, so take of that what you will. ozai doesn't consider her daemon to be a sign of weakness, due to its rarity. to him, it shows that she's simply that much more powerful, in that she'll never have to use her daemon in combat.


	3. Aang & Zuko, scars

Aang smiles, and looks up at Rahmi, curled around Zuko’s neck. Zuko’s eyes follow his gaze.

“She’s settled,” he says. “For real, this time.” He has a tender look in his eyes as he scratches Rahmi gently.

The question comes out before he can stop himself. “When?”

Zuko contemplates the question. “When I saw my Uncle again, something just… fell into place inside me. I felt like I was home.” Rahmi leans into his touch, content. “I haven’t felt this way since I was a kid.”

Dolma chirps for Aang’s attention, and Aang pulls her into his chest. “Yeah, I understand that.” He’ll never be able to have that idyllic home of his childhood again, but he can still honor it. He can still rebuild it so long as he hangs onto it, and never lets go.

Maybe Guru Pathik was a little wrong. Some earthly attachments are necessary. Some are precious, and some are beautiful, and some are so treasured and foundational to him that he could never let go, not without losing himself completely. He needs these attachments, just as they need him, to honor them, to give them life and hope and rebirth. History is never dead, so long as he harbors it inside him.

“You, too?” Zuko asks, watching Dolma snuggle into Aang’s robes, the Air Nomad beads shifting against Aang’s chest.

Aang nods. 

“How did it happen?”

“I don’t know exactly,” Aang replies truthfully. “But after I took Ozai’s bending, she looked at me and told me that she was settled.”

“I’m not sure about the exact moment either,” Dolma agrees. “But I think it was when he almost overcame you. I had this feeling in me, like I was digging my heels in.” She turns her face upwards. “They’ve already taken so much from us. And I thought  _ ‘no more’ _ .”

_ “No more,” _ Zuko echoes. “I’ll help you make sure of that, Dolma.”

She watches him quietly, before flying away from Aang’s hands. Aang lets her, and she lands on Zuko’s other shoulder.

“I know you will,” Dolma tells him, leaning against his neck. Neither of them startle in discomfort, and slowly, Zuko brings a hand up to ruffle her feathers fondly. A calm washes over Aang.

Together, Zuko and Dolma look like a matched pair. Her feathers are almost the same color as his scar, Aang notes, a bright scarlet juxtaposed against a faded one. Dolma is the daemon of the last airbender, the first peoples to die under the hand of fire. The first casualties in a war that created men so cruel they’d place their burning hands upon their children. And now, there’s a man with a scar in front of him, next to a daemon scarred by the same legacy, and they look alike, in a way. There’s something magnificently terrible about that, but there’s something about it that’s poetic, that’s  _ right. _

It’s what Zuko said. It feels like  _ home. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aang -- Dolma (Tibetan name meaning "mother of liberation", named for the [Bodhisattva Tara](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tara_\(Buddhism\)), who has many relevant associations, one of which is the mother of mercy and compassion), Northern Cardinal, intersex form.  
> Zuko -- Rahmi (Indonesian name meaning "mercy"), sable-sparrow.
> 
> HIGHLY recommend reading that wiki link, because dolma, as a name, means so much, almost all of which is very relevant to aang. also, aang's daemon is intersex due to his status as the avatar. she is generally feminine with masculine aspects -- for example, she has male plummage. she's also a non-hybrid daemon, like azula's, which is a sign of power. once i thought about the northern cardinal i couldn't really let go. there's a lot of wonderful symbolism surrounding the bird too -- signs of life, messengers of the spirit world, etc. -- and while it's not asian symbolism, they're connotations to keep in mind. sorry i went off there about aang's daemon, but there's genuinely a lot of cool symbolism! as a red bird, it seems more chromatically similar to the fire nation, which is kind of a product of how ozai almost overwhelmed him during the energybending scene, but as a perching bird, it's 100% a classic air nomad daemon. overall, aang and azula's daemon concepts are really some of my favorites. (creds to kuchi for azula's daemon form though!)  
> zuko's is a fairly nice form, too. sables are a type of marten; they're fantastic hunters and very resilient. but the sparrow aspect mellows that out and makes zuko a fairly agrable person. the combo is not too interesting on its own, but sables are a type of predator animal, and sparrows are a type of prey so... it's supposed to be a bit symbolic of zuko's eternal internal conflict.


End file.
